He started and resumed his work, remembering to pause for his patient model to rest twice over, and then to continue, and grow so excited over his efforts—painting so rapidly—that when he heard another weary sigh he glanced at the clock, and found that he had kept his model quite a quarter of an hour over her time.
“I beg your pardon, mademoiselle,” he said. “You must be very weary.”
“Yes, very weary,” she said sadly, as she moved towards the door, glancing over her right shoulder at the picture. “It is better now. I can look at your work; the dreadful face makes me too much alarmed.”
“A strange sitting,” he said. “Two veiled faces.” There was a quick look through the thick veil, but she walked on into the room, and in due time passed him on her way, bowed distantly, and went out, leaving Dale motionless by his canvas, gazing after her at the door, and conjuring up in his mind the figure he had so lately had before him.
He recovered himself with a start, and raised one hand to his forehead.
Chapter Fourteen.
Life’s Fever.
It was with a novel feeling of anxiety that Dale waited for the coming of his model. A peculiar feverish desire to know more of her position had come over him, and he made up his mind to question her about her father and the cause of his exile. Jaggs had said that he had had to flee for life and liberty, and if he questioned her about these she would, foreigner-like, become communicative.